| I'm now using a Brier Road acoustic in the studio. It sounds consistently fantastic, balanced and classic. It's an OM size, white oak with an Adirondack top. A fan fret that I mostly keep in DADGAD tuning (though it plays great in standard). It's equipped with a K&K mini pickup which sounds terrific. I also just picked up a Recording King 000 that's pretty dang awesome for the price and I've equipped it with a James May pickup. This is probably the guitar I'd take out on the road. I've just put together (as of April 2020) an acoustic-specific pedal board with a small buffer first, a Cooper FX Outward V.2, a Chase Bliss Mood, a Clinch FX Pico Pre (Echoplex-type preamp), the Jam Pedals Delay Llama Xtreme, the Zoom A1 Four and another buffer splitter on the output. The Zoom covers compression, EQ and grit when I need it with a touch of reverb. I still use Everly star picks, green medium-heavy's and blue 1.0mm on acoustic and purple 1.2mm on electric guitar, G7th and Shubb capos and Martin light/medium model strings on all my acoustic guitars (sometimes I use D'Aquisto Tony Rice model nickel medium strings while I can find some still around since the D'Aquisto factory closed. These strings are great on open tunings and have a somewhat "vintage" sound since they don't contain Phosphor Bronze). For electric on the road and in the studio I'm now using Novelli custom Offset models with Lindy Fralin P-90 and Telecaster pickups. I have two of them. My man Tom Cundall from London also just made me a killer S-style guitar with custom '59 pickups by Vaughan Skowe that's my favorite Strat EVER. My electrics are usually are all strung with Martin Jazz 12's. Sometimes 11's. I try to use as few pedals as possible and interact as directly with the amp as possible when playing roots rock but I sometimes use a Bearfoot Sea Blue EQ, a Ovnifx Smoothie compressor, Bearfoot Model G OD, maybe one fuzz, chorus (for one song), a simple slap delay and a plate or small hall reverb. (my avant jazz rig is far more expansive and constantly evolving but that's another looooong, obsessive story). I love Bearfoot Pedals (kudos to Donner Rusk), Trutone Effects and power supplies, Empress, Monsterpiece, Paul Trombetta, Pigtronix, Eventide, Alexander Pedals, Chase Bliss Audio, Drolo Effects, Faceless FX, Spiral Electric FX and Red Panda. Can't get enough of them. I'm sure I'm forgetting a few. My apologies. My tuners are always Sabine or those TC Polytune clip on ones. My straps are made for me by Long Hollow Leather in Franklin Tennessee and frankly they are the best and great people to boot. Lately I've been playing a bit of piano onstage and in the States I use a Roland 900 and in Europe a Korg Trinity V3 Pro X.
And yeah, when I'm playing experimental/free improvisation music I use a crazy amount of innovative pedals with my 8 string lap steels (Georgeboard and Rukavina) but they change from month to month so I don't repeat myself with sounds. Best to follow me on Instagram (@edpettersen) to see them or just drop me a line. I also own a Lazy River 8 string Weissenborn and a Gold Tone 8 string dobro that I use from time to time on recordings where appropriate. I run them through pedals as well. I use a Heil PR-35 mic exclusively on the road and Evidence Audio cables from guitar to DI (or amp). Love, love, LOVE the Evidence guitar cables. I A/B'd them to a lot of other cables and they won by far. The most clear and open without messing with your tone. I use EBS patch cables for all my pedal boards including my avant jazz rig. EBS's are the most reliable, best sounding, flattest and sturdiest that I've found for that purpose. I also like Disaster Area cables. The Heil is the best sounding hi-fidelity mic for my voice and captures all the nuance without losing the character. I've even started using the Heil in the recording studio because it sounds most like "me" and that's against much more costlier and storied mics. I use Mono cases for my guitars and pedalboard on the road. They are fantastically designed and superb at protecting my stuff while still being light and portable. If I've missed anything or you have any questions please don't hesitate to send me an e-mail and I'll try to answer your query as quickly as possible. | |